investigation

Lola815

an employee has compained that he feels he has been dicriminated against (racially). We would like to do an investigation, but he doesn't trust anyone in the company. Where should I turn for help outside of the company? This is the first time anything like this has happened that we don't feel we can take care of ourselves.

Thanks.

Don D

Is it that you don't think you can handle it internally or that you feel you must cave to his request for somebody else to handle it? I would not give any consideration to his 'distrust' of company employees. Company investigations are not democratic processes in which the complainant gets to decide how the investigation proceeds. Handle it with your current resources using your normal procedures. If your HR department is not capable of proceding with an investigation due to inexperience, ask your attorney to recommend a course of action. He/she may recommend that a legal aid handle it economically or he may recommend you outsource the investigation to a community business that does that.

In no event should you bargain/barter with a complainant about how you might proceed.

Lola815

I would say that we are caving to his request. Thank you for your advice Don.

marc

Don is right on this one. Do not let control of this investigation slip from your grasp - you will experience no end of headache if you do. Also, think of the precedent this may set for other investigations of nearly every kind. It is up to the company to investigate and if necessary, mitigate.

Parabeagle

Okay, I'll stick my neck out a mile with my two cents' worth.

While everyone raises good reasons for keeping the investigation internal, I would like to point out that if you go outside and have an attorney do the investigation rather than one of your staff, I believe the investigation becomes protected from disclosure because of attorney-client privilege. To me, that is more than enough justification to go outside. And you have the added benefit of the complainant not being able to claim you did not conduct a "fair and impartial" investigation, because a disinterested third party did it.

Lola815

That's one thing I love about this forum...all the opinions. Thanks for your advice.

Don D

So, Beagle, is that why you traveled to the South a few weeks ago to handle an investigation? Or did you decide not to outsource that one. If the HR Department considers outsourcing this type of thing, it may eventually outsource so much that the top guy there will decide to outsource the whole shootin' match. Do what you were hired to do and handle the investigation.

Parabeagle

That's true, I did. But the scenario Lola describes indicates that the complainant "does not trust" anyone within the company to do an investigation. In none of the investigations I've been involved with has the complainant viewed me as biased. If they did, I would have outsourced it. But you raise a good point about outsourcing TOO much... (better make sure my resume's in order).

Pork

PARABEAGLE:
NO NEED TO GET YOUR RESUME CLEANED UP! A one time opportunity to excel under the "NO TRUST OF ANYONE" theory in a racial case is probably good money well spent. I have conducted all types of incident investigations but I, too, have never experienced this "racial claim and not trust". I bet I would take the same bold action to hire an outside investigator with sworn statement capabilities, and achieve the attorney/client protections. There just might be something there that needs to be handled with "kid gloves" and the attorney/client protection, might just give you the room for maneuver to solve this case of all concerned, the company and the minority.

PORK

San Francisco

[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 10-06-03 AT 03:02PM (CST)[/font][p]Beagle, perhaps I am not reading you correctly. In our company, we are required to advise our attorney before we begin an investigation so that she can evoke the attorney/client privilege to protect our investigative notes. We are both in-house and I am not an attorney. It has become useful in depositions - where the opposing attorney is not privy to my notes. So, attorney/client privilge really isn't a justification to go outside -it can happen inside. I too have never had an employee declare he/she did not feel one of several qualified people within my company could conduct an impartial investigation. Usually, they save that for down the road when it didn't turn out as they wanted. I guess to ensure that didn't become an issue right from the start, I would consider an outside source. I feel rather conflicted on this one.

Elizabeth

Parabeagle

I think a lot of it would depend on the size of the company. If it's anything like mine (164 total ees, 4 states), we don't have the luxury of in-house counsel and to consult with a lawyer always means to go outside the company. If you have that depth of staffing, of course it makes sense to try to keep the investigation internal; however, I stand by my previous position that if the complainant views everybody working for the company as biased or untrustworthy, I would still outsource the investigation no matter how large the company was. It's a credibility issue.

San Francisco

I agree. The size of the company is not the issue. The issue is, to me, as Don stated letting the employee control. But, if the employee ends up not satisfied with the outcome, it will become a major issue. I would certainly want to know why an employee would feel that his/her HR department could not be impartial. I sure wouldn't want everyone deciding that - could really get expensive.

Elizabeth

Parabeagle

I refer to the size of the company only to illustrate that many small companies, such as mine, cannot afford to have lawyers on staff and therefore must outsource this task. As for why an HR staff would not be considered impartial, I can almost guarantee that if that perception exists, there is a reason for it.

Lola815

Thank you for all your advice. We have found out that there is one HR person who this employee will trust, so she has already started the investigation and we are going to consult our lawyer. Aparently this employee holds grudges and has been bitter towards quite a few employees for quite some time. I just found out that he has been mad at me for four years because of a payroll error that was fixed before payroll even went out. He is really good at what he does, but he is not a good employee.